Monthly Archives: August 2008

Jamie tells a couple of stories over at his site. They are reflections of the life he and his wife have chosen to live. Stories that come out of their experiences as they share the streets and neighborhood with the people in north Winnipeg.

Read them. They may challenge you to rethink some things about your own life and what God wants from you.

This afternoon I had to run to the closest shopping centre to pick up a bit of stuff for supper. As I was driving away from the grocery store, two police cruisers passed by in front of me. Unusual to have tow in a row I thought.

They pulled over a few feet ahead. On the bench "sat" a guy looking a bit passed out. The officer went over, picked up the remains of his twelve pack of beer and put it into his open trunk. Then he turned and was joined by the second officer. They were trying to rouse the fellow as I drove by.

It always makes me wonder when I happen upon an incident like this. I wonder – did something traumatic happen to him to make him turn to alcohol for solace? Did he spend his last money on such a short lived solace? Is he just another guy from a northern community that couldn’t resist the readily available booze available here? Is he really just another alcoholic? No way out of his addictions?

It is sad to see stuff like this. And yet there is so much more I don’t see on a regular basis that exists every day.

You’d think I had advertised a 10% off for Christians day at the office. First 4 patients were definite yeses – if I’d popped the faith question.

Seems as if a lot of young people are heading back to Bible college somewhere and are making sure their mouths are cleaned up!

And from the genuine nice behaviour of some other patients, I think they might have answered yes if the question was popped. And the one young woman that we gave a new smile to yesterday came in really smiling and happy so that was a huge blessing to me.

So far – a great day. Now we will have to see how the young children of Christian parents do late this afternoon. I’m not counting on smiles if they are like my grandchildren. But I can hope. (Of course I would never judge the faith of the parents by the behaviour of the children – should I?) 🙂

Update

The kids belonging to the perfectly wonderful mother were likewise perfectly wondeful. Way to go Luke and Madeline!

After work most of our staff headed up to one of the local pubs for wings and drinks. Now, I usually decline. It is not easy to just up and leave a starving family at home while head off to the pub. And sure, they really can look after themselves but there is this huge guilt thing about taking off to a pub after work, let alone leaving my family foodless.

But, tonight we were saying goodbye to the student who has been with us for the last six weeks or so, and he has been good to have around the office. How could I not want to say good bye in style?

I am glad I went. The kids survived and I had a nice glass of wine and some delicious lemon pepper wings.

Routines; we get tired of being stuck in them but when we have been out of them, it sure feels good to get back to them.

That is kind of what it feels like around here these days. It seems as if the routines of fall bring some kind of groundedness back to my life. So, it felt good to get up and go to work this morning. It kind of feels good to talk about getting Sara packed up and off to school. It feels good to be looking at starting up music lessons and orchestra again, getting back into the regular schedule of meetings, etc. And this week seems to be a bit on the full side of all of those things. I got out my bass and tuned it up this weekend and now must get back to practicing in earnest.

I think I will miss my own course work but I have already discovered a really good book that I am almost finished and want to read again because it was so full of stuff that resonated with who I have become – The Power of Solitude by Annamarie Kidder. And since I only borrowed this one, maybe I will have to buy it because I heard that her son wants to borrow it too. It is one that I think I would like to own so that’s okay I guess.

I’m also looking forward to getting back to meeting and talking with people – listening mostly. I find that I love the kind of listening I am able to do as a spiritual director. No better way to spend an hour than listening for the movement of God in a person’s life.